Jenna
woke up the next morning to a terrible pounding. She rolled onto her back,
pushing the pillow from off of her head and grimaced as bright sunlight seeped
through the cracks in the curtain. Her head throbbed. "That's it,"
she muttered. "No more drinking."

She
didn't have a hangover, of course. Growing up in a Mormon house in very Mormon
Provo, Utah meant she'd had very little exposure to alcohol or its effects
growing up, unless you counted what she'd learned from watching movies and
television. But that didn't mean she couldn't still pretend she had one. The
headache was probably due to having a pillow over her head when she slept,
creating an oxygen debt, carbon dioxide surplus thing that translated into a
headache. That or being thirsty. Sometimes that did
it. Yeah, the headache was probably due more to not drinking enough than having
drunk too much.

Two
aspirin would cure her headache, but the pounding was still there. "Who
the fuck is that?" she muttered, stumbling off the bed to go peer through
the peephole.

Through
the long, thin crack between the door and the door jamb, she could just make
out the silhouette of a man standing at her door. The peephole's glass was so
scratched and clouded that she couldn't tell a whole lot more by looking
through it. The man knocked again and called out, "Jed?"

Whoever
the hell it was, he knew her name. At least her old name.
That meant it wasn't the manager or anyone from the motel, stopping by to fix
the shower, or bringing her breakfast in bed. The manager would have asked for
Miss Kaye. Whoever it was stood perfectly still for a moment,
staring at the peephole. He must have noticed the shadow from inside,
and now was basically posing for her. He stepped back briefly, into the
sunshine, giving her a better view. He looked familiar.

"Jed?
It's me, Katon. Katon Jedry."

"Shit!"
she whispered. What was he doing here? Lucas must have sent him. What time was
it? No, it didn't matter. He'd already seen the shadow she'd made by looking
out the peephole. There was no way she could make him think she wasn't there.
"Shit!' she swore again.

Her
language would have been a surprise for Lucas, if he had been there to hear it.
Or to Katon, for that matter, which was one reason she made sure to keep her
voice down. Mormons don't swear. At least the good ones don't. And as Jed she'd
often reminded them to watch their language. It was a source of pride to her
that she could control her tongue. But somewhere on the journey from being male
to being female, and realizing that she wouldn't be allowed to be a Mormon much
longer - at least not one in good standing - an occasional cuss word had just
started to feel comfortable. At least in the privacy of her
own room.

She
glanced around. What could she do? Coming out to Katon Jedry hadn't been on her
list of things to do that day. Getting dressed wouldn't solve the problem. All
she had with her were skirts. She'd purposely left all her boy clothes behind
after donating them to charity, just to make her commitment to living as a
woman that much more binding.

The
sheets on the bed caught her eye, and gave her a plan. "Just a
minute," she called out. Katon stepped back and waited.

Jenna
stepped over to the bed and grabbed the sheet and the thin blanket she'd slept
beneath, and wrapped both tightly around her, making sure they covered her
breasts without giving any indication she had them. There was nothing she could
do about her hair at the moment. She'd taken off her makeup from the night
before, so there was nothing else to give her away. Except
for her fingernails.And her toenails.
"Shit!" she swore again. "Dammit, he's
gonna figure it out."

She
briefly considered making him wait while she quickly removed all the polish,
but it had taken her an entire episode of Jeopardy! to
get it looking the way it did - which was, in her opinion, spectacular, and she
wasn't fond of the idea of having to do it again. Plus it really wouldn't be
polite to have him wait that long. Perhaps if she used the
sheet and blanket to cover her feet, and kept her hands mostly hidden.
Yeah, that might work.

Finally
deciding there was nothing else she could do, she pulled the chain from the
latch and twisted the knob, opening the door. As the door swung open, she
skillfully stepped back, taking a seat on the bed where she could avoid having
Katon see too much of her.

"Jed?"
he asked, entering slowly.

"Yeah. Come in. Close the door."

He
was cute. Cuter than she remembered. Cherubic was the
best way to describe him. He reminded her of a cousin she had. A little heavy.Warm, innocent smile,
short blond hair, blue eyes, clean shaven. She knew she would need to
watch her step around him. What had Lucas said? That he was a sex addict? And
already she felt herself physically attracted to him. No, she needed to be
extra careful around him, or something was going to happen.

"Hey
dude! Great to see you, man." said Katon, closing the door and sticking
out his hand for a handshake.

For
a half-second, Jenna's instincts nearly took over and she was about to pull her
hand out and shake Katon's hand. Even though a hug seemed more appropriate. She
caught herself just in time. "I can't," she said. "I've been
coughing all morning. I might spread it." She added a quick "faker
cough" for effect.

Katon's
eyes narrowed as he stepped backward to sit on the desk. "Yeah, that's too
bad. Hey, you okay? Lucas told me you might need a place to stay or something.
What are you doing here? I thought you was back living
in Utah now."

"Yeah,
I'm fine." She shied away slightly, wary of letting him get too close. Not
for fear of the sex, but for fear of revealing her secret. "When did you
talk to Lucas?"

"Just this morning. He called like at five-thirty. He knows I
sometimes get an early start. Said he saw you last night and told me where you
was staying, and that you might need a place to stay and asked me to come over
and check on you."

"Lucas
called you?" she asked, surprised.

"Yeah,
so do you? I'd love to stay and chat all day, but I got a crew waiting for me,
or else I would. You still playing the drums?"

"Yeah,
I brought my electric drum set with me. I'm not playing with a band or
anything, though."

"Yeah,
me neither. Too busy doing other stuff." He grinned, giving her the
impression that other stuff meant sex. "It'd be cool if we could get
everyone back together again."

"Yeah,
that would be," she said, remembering to cough again.

Katon
reached into his wallet and removed a key from it. "Well, tell you what.
Here's an extra key to my apartment. If you want it, it's yours. It's just a
room with a foldout bed I hardly ever use. It's not as big as this,
but..." He paused and looked around briefly as if a rat or a giant
cockroach might suddenly appear to help make his point. "... It's a little
newer. You won't have to worry about bugs or rats or anything like that. Plus I
won't charge you nothing. Unless you
decide to make it permanent. Even then..."

It
was a generous offer. Jenna was tempted. She had money, but it had to last her,
so she also needed to be frugal. Her only other option was to stay with her
aunt and uncle. There was no guarantee that would work out, either. It meant
first coming out to them and telling them all about her decision to change
gender. That would lead to having to tell her parents. Uncle J was her
grandmother's baby brother and Aunt Nan, of course, was his wife. For all she
knew, once they learned what she'd done, they might disown her anyway. Or at
least tell her she wasn't welcome to live with them.

Katon
still didn't know, unless Lucas had told him. But the way he was acting, she
guessed he didn't know. At least he wasn't acting much like he knew. Telling
him wouldn't be nearly as hard as telling Uncle J and Aunt Nan. It would be
good practice. Plus it would give her a little more time to prepare for that
big visit to her aunt and uncle's house. She sighed. Yeah, it was a good idea.
Thanks, Lucas. And thanks, Katon. She really did have good friends. Maybe she
hadn't quite lost everything.

"I
gotta get going," said Katon. "But you're
welcome to move in anytime you want. I usually get home around four or five. If
you want we can go someplace for dinner."

Jenna
nodded toward the desk. "Just leave it over there. I have to pack all my
stuff up first. It'll take me a couple hours before I get there."

Katon
got up to leave. "Well, man, it's great to see you again. I'll let Kelly
know you're here, too. There's some stuff in the drawers in there, but just
throw it out and take whatever space you want in the closet. Okay, I gotta get going. I'm already going to be late. See you this
afternoon then."

As
he was leaving, Jenna stood, clutching the sheet and blanket around her and
said, "Thanks for letting me stay there, Katon. It's a big help."

"Sure, no problem. See ya
Jed." And he was off.

* * * * *

Dinner
with Katon out of the apartment was a bad idea, she guessed. He was going to
have a ton of questions, the first of which was going to be, “What? You’re a
girl now?” and it would be easier to answer those questions in the privacy of
Katon's apartment.

She
guessed he rarely ate a real home-cooked meal. What single adult male did? Plus
the opportunity to show off her domestic skills sounded fun. Jed's mother had
taught him how to cook, saying it was a valuable skill, one that would come in
handy as a missionary. And it had. While other missionaries had struggled when
it came to cooking their own meals, Elder King had felt, if not completely
comfortable, at least comfortable enough that it didn't cause him to worry. He
just figured out a menu, looked through a cookbook if he needed, and figured
out what he needed to buy and how to make it. It wasn't that hard.

The
trick was being able to put spaghetti and meatballs on the table just as Katon
walked in the door. "Mmmm, that smells good.
What is it?" he asked.

"Just
spaghetti and meatballs," she said. "I thought that might be more fun
than going out."

Katon
stopped dead in his tracks. "Who the hell are you?" he asked, staring
at the young woman who looked very much like same person he'd seen at the motel
earlier that day, but was obviously someone else, because this someone else was
wearing a skirt and had breasts, even though they were a little on the small
side, and was obviously female.

Jenna
blushed. "Surprise?"

For
a few seconds, Katon was literally speechless. He staggered to a chair and
literally fell into it. He kept staring at Jenna, and finally stammered,
"Surprise doesn't even come close. Are you...?"

Jenna
blushed some more. "It just...I just felt like... It was something I had
to do."

"That's
why you wouldn't even shake my hand this morning, isn't it? Okay, turn around.
I need to get the whole effect."

Jenna
slowly turned, realizing that an old friend from high school was checking her
out. An old friend whose cock she had sucked on more than one occasion as a
male. She wondered what he was thinking now.

She
finished her slow turn and faced him once again. "Do I look okay?"

"Okay?"
Katon gulped. "You're probably hotter as a girl than you were as a guy.
And you were pretty hot for a guy. So when did all this happen?"

"It's
been happening for about a year now, I guess. That's when I quit cutting my
hair. I started doing hormones last October."

"Do
you parents know?"

Jenna
shook her head. "No. Just you and Lucas so far.
You're the only ones."

"What
do you think they'll say?"

"I
don't know." It was a conversation she'd practiced more than once. In her
fantasies it sometimes went well, with everyone hugging one another and expressing
their love for each other. At other times, the conversation was nothing short
of a qualified disaster, one that was very nearly the ruin of her young life.

It
was those second times that made her question why she did it. Life would be so
much easier, she thought, if she just stayed the gender everyone expected her
to be. It was her response to those questions that told her she'd made the
right choice. Making an easy choice wasn't the issue. Being true to herself was the thing that mattered. And inside, she just
didn't feel right pretending to be a man.

Katon
leered a lot. He was always trying to sneak a peek down Jenna's blouses and
tops. He encouraged her to go topless, or even naked, an invitation she never
took advantage of. Giving Katon the idea that she was interested would only
cause problems down the road.

Still,
he was incredibly hard to resist. I mentioned his cherubic looks. He was smart.
Not yet thirty years old, and he was already the foreman of a landscaping crew.
Okay, maybe that wasn't so impressive, but it was a large crew, and most of the
workers spoke little or no English. Katon was chosen to be the foreman because
he spoke Spanish. A full-time management position was quite probable. He was
also a ton of fun to be around. He could be slightly unmotivated at times, but
everybody enjoyed his company.

And
then there was the sex. Despite Jenna's reluctance to let Katon see her nude,
Katon had no qualms at all about letting her see him nude. She insisted that he
wear clothes at the dinner table and in the common areas of the apartment. But
whenever he took a shower, he made sure she got a glimpse as he walked across
the hall from the bathroom to his bedroom. More often than not, he was sporting
an impressive erection as he did so.

It
was hard to resist. Jenna remembered that cock from high school. Long and slender. She would watch him without comment and
expressionless until he was out of sight. Then she would lick her lips and
close her eyes and wonder why it was again that she was choosing to remain
celibate.

Oh,
right! Lucas. "Some things are just between you and me." That was
Jed's promise to Lucas in high school. It was Jenna's promise to Lucas now.
That promise had allowed blow jobs, which is why she'd had Katon's cock in her
mouth on several occasions. But she knew with Katon's sex drive and hers, that
if she allowed anything close to that now, there would be no way to ever keep
that promise to Lucas.

The
question then was why she felt she needed to keep a promise, when Lucas had
already rejected her. In the week since they'd met at Lou & Jo's, he hadn't
so much as called her to talk. She had no reason to believe he felt the need to
honor their high school promise. Perhaps he'd broken it just as soon as Jed
went back to Utah. She didn't know, and didn't care to find out.

What
did matter was that, until she knew for sure that Lucas didn't want her, she
was determined to keep that pledge. It might not matter to him, but it mattered
to her. It was her way of remaining true. To something.
God knew there were so many things in her life that she'd failed to live up to.
She had to have at least one thing that mattered. No matter how pointless it
might sometimes seem to be.

So
she resisted Katon. She learned to lock doors. Katon was fond of entering the
bathroom when she was showering, claiming an emergency. She knew he would sneak
into her bed if she let him. He'd even tried it once, the first night she'd
been there. After that she started locking her door.

Letting
him look down her blouses and tops was one of the few consolations she would
allow. She didn't really let him as much as she pretended not to notice when he
was doing it. It seemed harmless enough. She knew he often masturbated after
she let him get a good look. It was easier than making a fuss about it. She let
him look, he'd go masturbate, and everything would be fine again. At least till
the sexual tension built up again. Which seemed to take about
an hour with Katon.

Her
biggest worry with her new roommate was the large amount of cash she was
obligated to hold onto.It was her life
savings. She couldn't put it into a bank. Not yet. She might be taking on the
appearance of Jenna Kaye, a female, but all of her identification was for Jedidiah
King, a male. She didn't know what to do about that. She didn't want to open a
bank account as Jedidiah, and then end up having problems getting her money
back out when the bank thought of her as Jenna. She believed she could leave
Jedidiah behind when she came east, but it turned out it wasn't as easy as she
hoped.

So
she hid the money in the safest place she could think of - her bra and panty
drawer. No one, not even Katon, would dare to disturb that.

But
one day she came home and found something amiss. Someone had definitely been in
her underwear drawer. A girl just knows. Some of her favorite panties were
missing. She checked for the cash, trying to remember just how much should be
there. She counted it. Twice. It was all there, as
best she could recall.

Later
that night, at dinner, she asked Katon if he'd by chance happened to be in her
underwear drawer.

Katon
blushed beet red. Busted. Jenna felt her anger slowly
rising to the surface. Couldn't she trust him? Katon, sensing her anger about
to explode, got up and hurried to his bedroom. When he came back he was holding
the panties she had lost. "I'm sorry," he said. "I'll wash them
and put them back."

"No,
just stay out of my drawer," she warned. "What were you doing with my
panties?"

Katon
blushed some more. "Jerking off," he admitted.

"Jerking...?
You use my panties? To jerk off?"

Katon
smiled shyly. "Yes. Man, Jenna, look at you. You're like the sexiest girl
I ever met, and you won't even let me look at you. And here I am living with
you. I just get so horny, I have to do something. So...
I borrowed some of your panties and think about fucking you while I jerk
off."

Jenna
tried not to smile. She was actually flattered, in a way. And he was just too
cute and innocent. "Did you take anything else of mine?" she asked,
pretending to still be mad.

Katon
grinned. "No, but you have a wad of cash in there
big enough to choke a horse. You really ought to put in the bank or something.
Is that what you're talking about?"

Did
I mention Katon was smart? He showed Jenna how she could set up a bank account
as Jenna Kaye, telling the bank that she was planning to do business under that
name, even though all of her identification documents were going to be under
the name of Jedidiah King. And as easy as that, her new life began to take
root.

* * * * *

One
night, shortly after she moved in, Jenna had a dream. You know how dreams go.
Not everything makes sense, and what does make sense doesn't necessarily mean
anything. That's not what I mean, though. What I mean is, just because it's
your dream doesn't mean you have to feel responsible for your actions in it.
Know what I mean?

Well
then, let me get more specific.

Jenna
dreamed she was having sex.

Ah,
sex. So many of us are motivated by it. And when
you're having it regularly, you might even start taking it for granted. Until you stop having it regularly. And then it starts to
become an obsession. If you're Katon Jedry, it can even become an addiction of
sorts. For Jenna Kaye, yeah, it was probably still in the realm of being an
obsession.

I
mean, it's not like she kept a running score card or anything for when she last
had sex, but it had definitely been a while. Unless you count
masturbation. Which is probably what gets most sex-obsessed people
through those times when they're not having the other kind of sex, but which
don't seem to qualify as true sex if you're keeping a running score card.

In
fact, unless you counted the near-miss with Lucas where he had sucked on her
breasts at the motel for just long enough to get her aroused, but not long
enough to help her climax, she hadn't had sex since arriving in Tennessee.
Living with Katon, where sex was a constant topic of conversation, was taking
its toll on her. In short, she was getting horny.

So, back to that dream. It was vivid. Erotic.Sensuous. In fact, you could almost write a whole
story around it, if you were so inclined to write stories about your sex
dreams. (Hey, wait! I resemble that remark!)

In
Jenna's dream, she was having sex with Lucas Mysinger. They were both
completely naked and she had her legs spread while he thrust his cock deep into
her waiting vagina. Except in her dream, she also had a penis, and her penis
was semi-stiff, bouncing obscenely up and down with each of Lucas's thrusts.
Lucas seemed to be enjoying the sight of her naughty little penis and kept his
eyes glued there, while she had her eyes on Lucas's chest, which had
miraculously taken on a much more massive, muscled appearance than she
remembered him having, as well as a great deal more chest hair.The way he was watching her penis aroused her
even more, so she felt her erection growing bigger and bigger with each thrust.

No,
it wasn't the kind of dream where it kept getting bigger and bigger until it
was so big that something bizarre happened. It just got bigger, and she could
feel it growing.

Oh,
and Lucas's suddenly more masculine looking chest greatly aroused her. In her
dream she kept reaching up, caressing his impressive pectorals and running her
fingers through the thick, dark hair.

Meanwhile,
as they say, she was very aware of another penis entering her from beneath.
This one was long and skinny, and she knew it belonged
to Katon. "No, Katon," she whispered, to the man beneath her. "I
can't do that. Lucas might find out."

So
Jenna's dream was that she was having sex with both Lucas and Katon at the same
time, and that she was trying desperately to make sure Lucas didn't notice what
Katon was doing. In her dream, despite her constant pleas to Katon to stop what
he was doing, she somehow managed to make Lucas believe she was simply moaning
for him to keep going. It was a tricky balancing act, even for a sex dream, and
she knew she wouldn't be able to keep it up much longer. The effect was slowly
increasing terror that finally woke her up.

For
a moment she lay there, considering the dream. It had been just a dream after
all. That was comforting. But what was its hidden meaning? Okay, probably the
only hidden meaning was that she was horny as hell, and wanted Lucas to come
back, and meanwhile was trying to keep from being sexually attracted to Katon.

"What
am I doing?" she asked as she climbed out of bed as if by some unseen
force. "This is insane."

Wearing
a modest black chemise with blue lace trim and matching panties underneath, she
slipped across the hall to Katon's bedroom door. "Katon?
Are you asleep?" she asked, knocking softly. She honestly didn't know if
she was about to ask him to have sex with her, or if she was there for some
other reason. Maybe she was sleep walking. Maybe she
was still dreaming. She could have pinched herself to make sure, but she knew
what the answer was. She was wide awake.

And
out of control, unable to stop herself.

"Katon?"
she repeated when she heard him stir.

"What?"

"Are
you awake?"

Pause.
"Yeah."

She
could almost hear his slowly hardening cock moving the sheets aside in response
to what he could only imagine was about to be a middle of the night sex
encounter. That's when she figured out why she was there. "I need to talk
to you."

"Okay."
Did she hear the sheets slump slightly? What was it about guys and the T-word?
Couldn't they figure out that girls needed to talk once in a while?

She
stepped toward the bed. "Uh, is it okay if I get in? I'm scared."

Scared?
Yeah, that was as good a description as any. Uneasy. Afraid
she'd screwed up her life. Uncertain what she should do about it. Scared was a
good one-word summary.

"Okay."
The sheets rising hopefully.

She
slid in beside him. So warm. God, she'd missed that
feeling of being close to another person. Was he naked? Oh, right, of course he
was. "Um, would you mind putting some clothes on? That's not why I'm
here."

Instant deflation."Sure, just a
second."

After
putting on some boxers, he slipped back in beside her. "Why are you
here?"

She
turned onto her side, her back to him. "I'm scared. I just need someone to
hold me for a little while. Is that okay?"

Katon
hesitated, but slipped his arm over her in a protective manner. "Okay,
sure. What's wrong?"

She
pressed back against him, knowing it would probably make him grow hard again,
but confident now that it wasn't going to lead to anything more than that.
"I had a bad dream."

"Oh.
What was it about?"

"It's
not important. It just scared me."

The
room was quiet for a few minutes, neither of them talking. Katon was unsure
what exactly was going on. He'd been attracted to Jed when they were both boys
in high school, and he was even more attracted to him now as Jenna. He'd been
imagining what it would be like to have her in bed with him ever since he'd
first got a glimpse of her perky little breasts. Hell, even before that. From
the moment Lucas had told him that Jed was in Mayville and might need a place
to stay, Katon had been having thoughts of a sexual nature.

But
she'd already said that wasn’t why she was there. He wasn't exactly used to the
role of being a protector. A girl in your bed was supposed to mean sex. Not...
whatever this was. He wasn't even sure if he was doing it right. He guessed if
she fell asleep, that would mean he'd done it right.

Jenna
was quiet for a different reason. She was forming her thoughts. Waiting for him to be fully aware that she wasn't there for sex.
Wanting to make sure she had his attention.

Finally
she spoke, "Katon?"

"Yeah?" She could tell he hadn't been asleep.

"I
think I really screwed up with Lucas." Pause. "He was at my motel the
night before you came over." She knew that wasn't really news to him, so
she didn't wait for a reply. She did hesitate,
however, as she considered how much detail she should give him about what they'd
done. Given how easily aroused Katon was, and the way she was pressed against
him at that moment, she decided to skip over as much of the sex parts as
possible.

"It
seemed like everything was going fine, and I thought we were going to even get
back together. And then suddenly he said, 'Maybe some other time,' and left. I
don't know what happened. Have you heard anything?"

It
was Katon's turn to hesitate. The only thing he'd heard from Lucas had been
that Jed was in town and might need a place to stay. Since then he'd spoken
once with Lucas, but only to let him know that Jenna had moved in to his spare
bedroom. "Okay, great. Thanks a lot, Katon. Let me know if she needs
anything else," he'd said, his tone suggesting that there was nothing else
to say on the subject.

On
the other hand, getting mixed up in the middle of a lovers' quarrel wasn't a
good idea either. "No, not really," he said, finally.

"And
I screwed up with my family, too. They don't know anything about me deciding to
be a girl." The words were starting to pour out. "My parents are in
Mongolia, on a mission. It's going to kill them to find out. I don't even know
how to let them know. I was going to stay with my aunt and uncle, but now I'm
afraid to tell them. Katon, I'm going to get excommunicated, you know."

Katon
knew a little about the LDS church and how important it had been to Jed.
"I'll still be your friend," he offered.

Despite
not knowing what to do, Katon's response was perfect. It was just what Jenna
needed to hear - that as bad as things looked there was still at least one
person she could count on. "Thank you," she whispered. And then she
pulled his hand up to her mouth and kissed it. He deserved at least that much
from her.

"I've
never been excommunicated before," she said.

"Me
neither."

She
laughed. "You're not even a Mormon."

It
felt good to hear her laugh. He sensed he might be handling this right after
all. "Oh, right. I keep forgetting."

In
Katon's defense, it was the kind of thing you might actually forget. His mother
was a member, and had been for some fifteen years. For nearly
as long as he could remember. And during that time, for a lot of that
time, Katon had been dragged to church with her. He knew as much about the
church as any non-member could know, and probably more than a few of its
members. Of course he'd quit attending regularly once he moved to his own
apartment. That had been four years ago. But if anyone ever asked what his
religious affiliation was, he told them he was a Mormon. He liked the teachings.
He just didn't have an urge to confess his sins and to stop being sexually
active.

Which was very much the same situation
Jenna was in, come to think of it.
All her life religion had played a major role in her life, and so had sex. And
the two were always, it seemed, at odds with one
another. For a time, religion had dominated. During that time Jed went on a
mission and tried to do all the things his bishop and mission president had
suggested. He'd tried dating, but never really found anyone who made him feel...

Yeah,
that was definitely a problem. No one, no one of the female sex at least, made
him feel the way he felt about Lucas. He knew he loved Lucas. The same way Paul
loved Timothy. As a brother. That's what he told
himself. But, deep down, he always sensed it was something different. Something that wasn't supposed to be there. Good Mormons,
ones who'd gone on missions, weren't supposed to be gay. They weren't supposed
to be attracted to other males. It wasn't supposed to happen that way.

"I
quit my job," she continued.

"Doing
what?"

"Test
engineer. It was a good job, too."

"Why'd
you quit?" he asked softly, more because it seemed like she wanted to keep
talking than out of real interest.

She
took a moment to answer. It was painful. "Because I didn't
want to be that anymore. I wanted to start living as a girl. Full time. I even left all my boy clothes behind. I don't
have any boy clothes at all now. Just girl clothes. I
thought it would make it easier or something. Or at least
harder to go back. I didn't want to go back."

Katon
noticed the past tense. "Do you want to go back now?"

She
took another moment to think about her answer. "No."

Did
I mention Katon was smart? In the middle of the night, he was helping Jenna to
see herself, in very much the same way a psychoanalyst like her uncle, J. K.
Elkins might do if he'd been treating her as a patient in his office.
"Then it sounds like you made the right choice," he said.

Okay,
maybe not quite J.K. Elkins, but getting there.

"He
doesn't even care if I exist, Katon."

"Who?"

"Lucas."

"How
do you know that?" he asked. He slowly started reaching for one of her
breasts, hoping for a quick feel and a squeeze.

"Katon,
promise me something?"

"What?"
He was almost there.

"We
can't have sex. It'll ruin everything. I'll never get Lucas back if he knows
you and I..." her voice trailed off. Katon's
hand, caught in mid-grab stopped, hesitated, and then slowly withdrew.

As
if his retreating hand was an answer, Jenna continued. "I want him back,
Katon. That's why I'm here. I left everything behind. Everything! Just because
I thought I could come here and Lucas would take me back. And then... he left.
And I don't know if he's ever coming back."

Her
voice cracked and she started sobbing. Katon instinctively patted her shoulder,
and felt himself being sucked into the middle of
whatever was going on, or not going on, between her and Lucas. Right where a friend had no business being. No, it was right
where a friend would be. That's what made it so frustrating. As a friend, to
Lucas and now Jenna, and formerly of Jed, he knew what he needed to do. It
didn't mean he wouldn't have rather been doing something else. Like getting her out of her clothes for a good fuck.Tranny pussy was just as good as real pussy if you asked
him. Maybe better. And those tits! Maybe if he could just get one look at them,
one quick feel, he might be able to do it.

But
that's not what a friend would do.

Her
sobs soon disappeared, and she rolled onto her back to look at Katon in the
darkness. "Promise?"

Katon
hated himself. "Yes."

"Even if I ask you?"

"What?"
he protested. "If you ask, then the deal's off."

"No, because you made a promise."

"Yeah, but not if you're breaking it
first."

She
was quiet for a moment, gazing at him before she spoke. "Katon, you're
cute. You're sexy. I'm... I'm really, really attracted to you. Okay?"

His
erection started climbing. He felt it pressing against her thigh. Her bare thigh.So smooth.Just one touch. That's all he wanted.

"That's
why you have to promise me."

He
groaned inside as his loyalty was tested again. Is this what it took to be a
friend? "Okay, I promise."

"No matter what?"

"No matter what."

"If...
If I asked you to kiss me right now? Would you?"

He
stared. It sounded like one of those trick questions. The kind Jed had been
good at asking. "Do you want me to?"

"I
want you to, but I want it to just be a kiss because I trust you. Not because
we're going to have sex."

He
kissed her softly. "How was that?"

She
took a deep breath. "It just made me horny."

"You
better go sleep in your own bed," he warned.

She
took a moment. What she really wanted was to reach down and grab his dick and
start playing with it. But she'd made him promise."Yeah, I think you're right,” she said,
and rolled out of bed.

Pausing
at the doorway, she said, "Katon, will you help me, though?

"Help
you what, Hon?"

"Help
me get Lucas back?"

"I'm
already working on it," he assured.

* * * * *

"Okay,
just one question," said Katon at breakfast the next morning.

"What's
that?" asked Jenna.

He
stared at her gravely. "I'm just going to ask, and you can tell me it's
none of my business, and I promise I won't ever ask again."

"What?"

"I
just got to know. Okay? What does it feel like to have tits?"

Jenna
stared at him, trying to look offended, or disgusted, or annoyed, or astonished
by his question. But, honestly, his cherubic face was so disarming and innocent, the best she could manage was a mildly annoyed
expression. After a moment's thought, she said, "Katon, I'll tell you.
It's kind of like having two little peckers on your chest, one on each side.
And they poke out, so everyone can see them and know
you have them, so it's like they're always on display. It's almost like you're
walking around half-naked all the time. And so you're walking around feeling
horny all the time."

When
she appeared to have finished with her explanation, Katon stared at her, not
sure if she was joking or serious. She looked serious. She wasn't grinning as
if she was teasing him. But maybe she was.

If
she was telling the truth, Katon realized, having tits was really a pretty good
thing. It almost sounded like something he might want to try himself some day. Provided he could go back to being himself whenever he wanted.
He didn't think he'd like to do what Jed had done and make it a permanent
condition.

For
Jenna's part, she was serious. That's exactly what it felt like. She knew Katon
had an exhibitionist streak in him and so did she. That's one reason she often
preferred not to wear a bra under her thin cotton t-shirts - just for the shock
value of feeling like she was putting her feminized body on public display and
to see people's reactions. She liked the attention. Mostly
from guys. Guys' reactions were almost always positive. Women tended to
react more negatively, and sometimes she could almost sense their thoughts: Slut! Whore! Bitch!

It
didn't matter. Pleasing women wasn't a major priority in her life. Men were.
And if giving them a glimpse of her protruding nipples covered by a thin layer
of cotton was enough to arouse them, then it was the least she could do for
them. In a way, she thought, it was almost her duty to let them see her nipples
that way.

Within reason, of course. She had to be careful. In the wrong place
at the wrong time and with the wrong person, too much of a reaction could be
costly. Like that time at Jo & Lou's when she had met Lucas. She knew those
guys in the bar might get the wrong message from it, but she decided to take a
chance because she definitely wanted to get Lucas's reaction.

Of
course, look how well that had worked out.

When
she showed no signs of being anything but completely serious, Katon finally
gulped and said, "Okay, thanks. Now I know."